The One Thing You Must Know Before An Emergency Hits
Time is of the essence in a crisis.
That’s why several decisions need to be made before disaster strikes.
And there’s one thing you must know before an emergency comes.
Deciding when to bug out or hunker down is a critical decision.
If you opt to bug out, you probably have a location and an equipped bug out vehicle.
However, many people can overlook planning their escape route.
Getting to your bug-out location is completely different in a SHTF scenario versus ideal circumstances.
If you’ve done your due diligence, you should have a solid evacuation plan with several alternates routes.
If you live in a city and a disaster hits such as a terrorist attack or natural disaster, your primary route out of town might be completely gridlocked.
It’s possible that you might have to take the long and unconventional way to safety.
This could mean back streets, older and smaller highways, and remote access roads on and off the freeway.
Boating and off-roading might even be a smart option, depending on your location.
Cities and roads could be entirely blocked in certain SHTF crises, so boats and ATVs should be considered.
If your area calls for it, these escape options could give you a significant boost in the face of an emergency.
In order to build an evacuation plan, you need to know several variables for all of your alternate routes.
For example, there are often notifications for planned freeway construction, so you need to be mindful of that.
If you only have one plan, it’s easy to panic and make a bad choice.
If flooding is an issue in your environment, it’s important to know which routes frequently become undriveable in heavy rain so you can navigate around them.
It’s important to have a hard-copy map on hand, but you also need a good GPS system.
Each have pros and cons that make having both the smart play.
A paper map may be outdated and not have smaller roads visible.
It also doesn’t have traffic updates in real time.
However, being too reliant on GPS can put you in serious jeopardy.
Travelers who are too dependent on GPS lose their sense of direction, and may not realize their GPS is leading the opposite direction.
The GPS could confuse two parts of town that have the same street name.
Test out the routes ahead of time so there won’t be any unexpected developments.
Be aware of how many gas stations there are, or any other locations that could be critical to your survival.
It’s also a good idea to ask locals about the natural flow of traffic during different parts of the day and different parts of the year.
For example, if you live in the southeast, the hurricane season will have a completely different feel than perhaps the summer months when there are a lot of tourists.
If you do the extra work in preparing your escape plan, it will pay huge dividends when SHTF.
